Chapter 2 - THE LOCKED BALLROOMFor half a second, nobody moved.
Then the fire alarm screamed again.
Red emergency lights began flashing above the ballroom doors.
Four hundred wealthy, frightened people reacted exactly like four hundred frightened people anywhere else.
They rushed for the exits.
“Everyone remain calm!” a security officer shouted.
Nobody listened.
Chairs scraped backward. Wineglasses shattered. A woman near the stage stumbled, and her husband pulled her upright as guests began pressing toward the main doors.
Arthur Vance never left his chair.
He looked at Clara.
“Was there anything else in the video?”
“No.”
“Did they see you?”
“I don’t think so.”
“You don’t think so?”
“I hid behind the service wall.”
Victoria seized Arthur’s arm.
“We need to leave. Now.”
Arthur stared at her hand.
Victoria slowly removed it.
“You’re not leaving,” he said.
Her face tightened.
“Arthur, there’s a fire alarm.”
“And twenty seconds ago, I watched you poison my wine.”
“That video is fake.”
“Then you should be very interested in staying until we prove it.”
Julian moved between them.
“Dad, whatever this is, we need to get somewhere secure.”
Arthur finally stood.
He was tall despite his age, broad-shouldered and controlled.
The shocked old man Clara had seen while he watched the video had disappeared.
This was the man who had built an international company by surviving hostile takeovers, lawsuits, recessions, and boardroom coups.
He pointed toward the head of security.
“Dawson.”
A gray-haired former federal agent appeared immediately.
“Sir.”
“Treat this as an attempted homicide.”
Victoria laughed sharply.
“Have you lost your mind?”
Arthur ignored her.
“Find Dr. Reed. Nobody from my family leaves. Secure the wine, the decanter, every glass at this table, and the pantry where that video was recorded.”
Dawson hesitated.
“The alarm—”
“Is it real?”
Dawson touched his earpiece.
A pause.
Then his expression darkened.
“No fire reported. Alarm originated manually from the service level.”
Arthur glanced toward the doorway through which Malcolm Reed had disappeared.
“Of course it did.”
Clara’s stomach tightened.
Dawson issued orders into his radio.
The panic was gradually controlled. Hotel security redirected guests to a second ballroom while police units were summoned.
Victoria stood perfectly still.
Arthur looked at Clara.
“Come with me.”
She hesitated.
“Sir, I’m working—”
“You’re no longer working.”
Clara’s heart sank.
Arthur saw her reaction.
“I don’t mean you’re fired.”
“Oh.”
“Considering you just stopped me from drinking that, I suspect your shift is over.”
Despite everything, Clara almost laughed.
Almost.
Arthur led her toward a private lounge behind the ballroom.
Julian followed.
So did Victoria.
When she attempted to enter, Dawson stepped into her path.
“Mrs. Vance, please wait here.”
“This is my husband.”
“It’s my order,” Arthur said.
Victoria stared at him.
“You believe her?”
“I believe what I saw.”
“You saw forty seconds on a phone.”
“I saw my wife pour something into my wine.”
“It could have been anything.”
Arthur looked at her.
“That may be the least reassuring defense imaginable.”
He entered the lounge.
Clara followed.
Julian closed the door.
For several seconds, Arthur simply stood there.
Then something changed.
His shoulders dropped.
He looked older.
“Show me again.”
Clara handed him the phone.
He watched the video twice.
Julian watched beside him.
By the second viewing, Julian’s face had gone pale.
“That’s Mom.”
Arthur said nothing.
“And Reed.”
Nothing.
Julian stepped away.
“Why?”
Arthur paused the video on the vial.
“That is what I’d like to know.”
Clara studied father and son.
There was love between them.
But there was something else too.
Tension.
Old tension.
Arthur noticed her watching.
“You’re wondering whether my son is involved.”
Julian turned.
“What?”
“No,” Clara said quickly.
Arthur almost smiled.
“You’re terrible at lying.”
“I’m a waitress.”
“Tonight, apparently, you’re also my detective.”
Julian folded his arms.
“Dad.”
“Relax. If she wanted me dead, she could’ve waited thirty seconds.”
The door opened.
Dawson entered.
“We have a problem.”
“Reed?”
“Gone.”
Arthur’s jaw tightened.
“He exited through the loading dock approximately four minutes before we sealed the building.”
“Police?”
“Searching.”
“What about Victoria?”
“She’s still here.”
“And the pantry?”
Dawson hesitated.
“Someone cleaned it.”
Clara stared at him.
“What?”
“When officers arrived, the decanter from your video was gone. Counter wiped. Trash removed.”
Arthur’s eyes narrowed.
“How long?”
“Within the last twenty-five minutes.”
“That means they had help,” Julian said.
Dawson nodded.
“Almost certainly.”
Arthur looked down at Clara’s phone.
“Then this recording is the only evidence left.”
Dawson shook his head.
“Not exactly.”
He held up an evidence bag.
Inside was Arthur’s wineglass.
“We still have this.”
Arthur exhaled.
“Test it.”
“Already being transferred to the lab.”
Then Dawson glanced at Clara.
“And we found something else.”
He handed Arthur another transparent bag.
Inside was a small folded piece of paper.
Arthur read it.
His face changed.
“What does it say?” Julian asked.
Arthur handed it to him.
Clara could see the handwriting.
Three words.
THE WRONG GLASS.
Julian looked confused.
Arthur did not.
“Dad?”
Arthur sank into a chair.
“Ten years ago,” he said quietly, “someone tried to poison me.”
Clara felt every hair on her arms rise.
Julian stared at him.
“What are you talking about?”
“I never told you.”
“You never told anyone?”
“One person knew.”
Arthur looked toward the door.
“My first wife.”
Julian’s mother.
The woman who had supposedly died in a boating accident eleven years earlier.
Clara saw something on Julian’s face.
Not shock.
Fear.
“Dad…”
Arthur looked at him.
Julian swallowed.
“Mom told me.”
Silence.
“When?” Arthur asked.
Julian’s voice was barely audible.
“Three days before she died.”
Arthur stood so suddenly that the chair struck the wall.
“What did she tell you?”
Julian closed his eyes.
“That if anything ever happened to you, I should never trust Malcolm Reed.”
Arthur stared at his son.
“And you waited eleven years to tell me?”
“I was seventeen!”
“You were twenty-seven last year!”
“I thought she was paranoid!”
Arthur’s anger cracked.
“Your mother died three days later!”
Julian shouted back.
“And you married Victoria six months after the funeral!”
The words landed like broken glass.
Arthur went silent.
Clara wanted to disappear.
Instead, she remained frozen near the door.
Dawson’s phone buzzed.
He answered.
“Yes?”
His expression changed.
“When?”
He looked at Arthur.
“We found Dr. Reed’s car.”
“Where?”
“Under the Brooklyn Bridge.”
“And Reed?”
“No sign of him.”
Dawson paused.
“But there’s blood on the driver’s seat.”
Arthur looked again at the note.
THE WRONG GLASS.
Then Clara’s phone vibrated.
A number she didn’t recognize had texted her.
She opened it.
There was a photograph.
Taken less than a minute earlier.
It showed Clara standing inside the private lounge.
Someone had photographed her through the glass panel in the door.
Below it was one sentence.
You should have let him drink.
May you like
Clara looked up.
Someone in the hallway was running.
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